Loose Lips Sink Ships
by HaraBarbie
Summary: When Dash discovers Danny's secret upon finding Sam's diary, he informs her that he will not reveal her best friend's secret to the town and turn them against him if she poses as his girlfriend. The catch? She cannot tell Danny the real reason for staying at Dash's side. Please read and review.
1. Chapter 1

"Whoever wishes to keep a secret must hide the fact that he possesses one." ~Johann Wolfgang von Goethe

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_(Untitled entry)_

_He soars through the sky like a raven on the highest of winds on the cloudiest of nights. His ordinary clumsiness leaves and he is like a swan as it glides across the crystal waters of some ocean unknown to me in my colorless town. He possesses the strength of an eagle or vulture but a beauty which is that of a white dove as it unfolds its wings. He sings like a nightingale, but only when it is dawn and there is none around to hear him. So shy, and needlessly so—why should such a beautiful bird shrink away from lesser eyes? Lesser eyes, but inviting eyes of shelter and nourishment nonetheless?_

_In the morning, when I wake in the early hours to hear his call, his song, mystifying in its morbidity, so much so even I cannot comprehend, sounds like this, in reply to my quandary, but providing no answers I can accept: "My perfection is foreign to this little town, and if I'm discovered they won't want me around. Too bright for their dull bricks and oppressive gray sky, they'll cry, 'Away, away you must fly!'"_

_December 2_

_When it started to snow today, I saw his eyes light up—something you don't see take place much in those eyes, I can assure you. I think he used to hate snow, because it made him cold and limited how long he could stay outside to play. But, I think, it has become special to him because it reminds him of the old days when staying inside with the family or having to wear a jacket were his only problems. Now, with the ghosts invading, he's constantly busy, and if he really did want to enjoy the season of winter in all its glory, he wouldn't have time. I guess that's why it makes him so sad, too, and I feel badly for him. I guess I'll have to pick up slack when it comes to the ghosts, too, and maybe we can go pick out a tree to decorate before Christmas._

_I bet I sound like Paulina or any other slut at our school, but I can't help hoping we'd get under some mistletoe!_

_December 4_

_Yesterday was incredibly eventful. We CERTAINLY did not have any time to go tree-shopping, because we ran into so many ghosts, I don't think I can remember them all, and that's really saying something. A lot were nameless, to my credit, but we did come across Young Blood and a menagerie of the Box Ghost's boxes. Tucker suggested we open them all to see in which BG was, and because Danny figured he wouldn't have time to sit down with his family to open presents on Christmas, he decided to go along with it! I guess we did have fun, because the box ghost isn't one of those that you need to take seriously, and it was really nice seeing him smile again. Unfortunately, his eyes did not brighten because the snow held off, but I'm praying it stays until Christmas day, at least! I need to take these two sledding and snowman-building ASAP before they become ugly work-hermits like my grandpa! Hopefully Dan won't be too preoccupied this week and we can give it a go—maybe the ghosts will give him a break just this once. A Christmas present from them to him, maybe…but I doubt it._

_December 7_

_Like usual, Danny had to ditch class again to go off and fight ghosts. I would have gotten up, too, but we had a test and lord knows my parents don't take kindly to bad grades. Although, I feel terribly for leaving him to fend for his own—I mean, I know he can usually handle the ghosts on his own, but he shouldn't have to. I think that Danny and I have a lot in common, but when it comes to his ghost powers, we totally disagree; he thinks his powers are a curse bestowed upon him by some vengeful god, but I see them as a blessing—that is, if he didn't have to fail tests or skip school to use them. I know he's totally against it, but I can't help but feel he'd be so much better off if he just went ahead and told his parents. He's totally against it—every time I mention it he insists that he would be run out of town by a mob armed with torches and pitch forks, but I think that everyone has really warmed up to Danny Phantom, and if they knew that he and Danny Fenton were one and the same, I think…_

There was more on this page, and countless other entries proceeding, but the blonde-haired boy did not read further; in fact, he did not _need_ to. These pages, scrawled messily in dark-purple ink, the sides of each covered repeatedly with the logo of the town's resident ghost, Danny Phantom, held all the information Dash Baxter needed to affirm his convictions. However, to be safe, he slipped the diary of his classmate, Sam Manson, into the inside pocket of his letter jacket. Smirking, he pulled the coat closed and went about relocking the girl's locker, which had been personalized with morbid drawings and overrun with bottles of dark makeup and tubes of purple lipstick. When it was secured, he exited the school through the window in which he'd come, and got into his car, a birthday present from his mother and father upon turning sixteen. It was late—almost three in the morning by the time he left the school—but he could not return to his home just yet.

There was a certain goth girl he needed to visit before he would withdraw into sleep.


	2. Chapter 2

Hey, everyone.

I hope you like this chapter, and please review.

Thank you so much.

Is it just me, or is Sam lucky? I wish I had a mom who would constantly shower me with flowery dresses!

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At three in the morning, one would expect the normal, sleep-driven teenager to be nestled beneath the sheets of their bed—aside nights before which there is an exam or when a cherished lover has come to visit—and slumbering peacefully, but Sam Manson was not the normal teenager. Unlike most people her age, she chose to dress in black, and did so on the hottest of days in their little town, and unlike most _families _who resided there, hers was rich, enough so that on Friday nights should could stay home but could see a movie and go bowling at the same time. As a result, her bedroom was grand, and her bed was perhaps large enough to fit three adults comfortably—one any child in Amity Park would have longed to rest in, but in the early hours of the morning, before darkness left, it remained empty. She kept the place lit by candles and in these late to early hours would read or write poetry by their romantic light, her mind consumed with the one thing that never seemed to leave, even when much more prominent matters arose: Danny Fenton.

On her dresser, amongst the plastic containers of dark eye makeup and tubes of lipstick and skull-shaped perfume bottles, one silver and one clear, each containing scents she had inadvertently hoped would allure Danny, she had created something of an alter. Between two parchment-colored candles, there was the school picture he'd given her the summer after eighth grade. In front of this, there was the little clay sculpture of Cujo Danny had made when they'd taken pottery together and given to her when it was finished. When not in use, she kept her book of poems and notes of each day in front of this with a purple feathered-pen nearby. Often, she would wake when all else was silent, and she would sit at the dresser and stare at his picture, taking inspiration from its crisp, professional quality and putting it into tightly scrawled letters only she could read—or so she would think.

This night, a Friday, had been similar to most. She fought out of her silk sheets—only the finest for her, her parents insisted tiredly, although she would constantly note that they had adapted a sort of robotic-ness in their smile—and stepped onto her carpeted floor wearing only a pair of black panties. Her breasts, just beginning to develop, wobbled, and she groaned softly and reached up to caress them. She had, of course, begun that awkward stage of her life in which puberty hit, and she found that her desire to have Danny as her own emerged only as her sex drive made itself known. It was, to say the least, thoroughly confusing, and the lord knew she would not go to her parents for guidance; rather, she spent many a long hour trapped in her room, expressing the oppressive emotions in the form of poetry, or even, on several occasions, touching herself as she stared at the alter she'd created for the boy she so craved. Thus, she was left feeling very dirty and as if she had betrayed not only herself, and everything she'd thought she stood for, but Danny as well. Upon reflection, she realized that if Tucker, say, had been masturbating to _her_ image, she would have felt very offended, and so why should not Danny? And while this was discouraging enough to kindle a desire in her to stop, she found that the pain that would overtake her if she were to suppress her desire to have him was much too great and would perhaps cause her to act very irrationally if she could not somehow remove it from her rapidly developing body.

Her desire to tell Danny her afflictions was greater than perhaps the desire to have him, because the guilt had built inside her so that she felt as if there was an elephant sitting on her chest, suppressing her breath and making her slow and immobile, although her mind was racing and her heart was beating, and so she might have, if she were not fearful of the outcome this would have. Of course, she saw the way her best friend stared at the school's sweetheart, Paulina, a girl who felt slighted because she could afford to buy designer clothing but could not have a Gucci bag, which Sam had considered purchasing in hopes of enraging the girl out of jealous spite. She would never understand what Danny saw in her, but she had heard Tucker suggesting he flaunt his ghost powers to her as a way of picking her up, because lord knew how she loved Danny Phantom, and Danny had said, "She wouldn't like him anymore, so I'll just let him have his fun and wait 'til I get muscles like Dash before I make my move" and this, to her, was very broad indication that he had no interest in anyone other than the Hispanic cheerleader who she so despised. She feared that if she were to admit her attraction to him, she would have to face his refusal, and though it was cowardly and unproductive she felt it was easier to go about life pretending that there may be a chance for his love rather than learn to accept the reality of her situation. Also, she felt that doing so would distance her from Danny, and she realized that while she might be able to get on staring endlessly at his picture and touching herself if she could not have him as a boyfriend, the pain that would come if she were to lose him as a _friend_ might kill her…literally.

So she would go on in this way, forcing herself to feel content to talk with him everyday and feel thankful that she could displace her aggression into poetry, but this night, when she staggered over to her dresser and jerked open the drawer in which she kept her black bras, making all of her little bottles jingle as their surfaces touched and the flames of the candles dance, her skeleton bobble-head nodding in approval, she noticed the book, which served doubly for poems and as a diary, was missing from the place on which it sat when not in use. It occurred to her then that in her haste to assist Danny this afternoon with one of the ghosts that had attacked, she had left it in her locker, along with her favorite pen and perhaps a good deal of other things she would need throughout the entirety of the weekend. She made a sound of frustration at this realization, coupled with the soreness of her breasts, and slammed her fist on her lace covered-surface of her dresser. The candle flames beat wildly in this new wind, and tubes of makeup tipped over onto one another and fell like dominos. Danny's picture soundlessly slipped forward and onto the table, face down.

The doorbell rang downstairs, and Sam, whose parents were gone for the weekend on business, expected it to be either of her friends, or both, with news of a ghost attack they must go handle. Grumbling, she pulled on a pair of worn blue jeans and the Dumpty Humpty band t-shirt she wore when she could not be bothered to put on her usual skirt and tights. She glanced briefly about the surface of her dresser for her hairbrush, but it became apparent that she had also left this in her locker, and she grunted in distaste, quickly running her fingers through her hair to smooth it. Because she constantly—and almost inadvertently—strove to impress Danny, she quickly covered her face in a powder she'd bought to appear paler and applied eyeliner. The bell's cheery ring came again, and while she made her way down the stairs she hastily stroked mascara on her lashes.

"Coming!" she said as she shuffled to the doorway.

It would appear that her beautification would go unnoticed—though it might have anyway—because when she opened the door she did not see Danny; she saw Dash Baxter, the bully who had tormented them since kindergarten.


End file.
